“
Ninety percent of the children’s books patronize the child and say there’s a difference between you and me, so you listen to this story. I, for some reason or another, don’t do that. I treat the child as an equal.
”
”
Dr. Seuss
“
this is the 21st century and we need to redefine r/evolution. this planet needs a people’s r/evolution. a humanist r/evolution. r/evolution is not about bloodshed or about going to the mountains and fighting. we will fight if we are forced to but the fundamental goal of r/evolution must be peace.
we need a r/evolution of the mind. we need a r/evolution of the heart. we need a r/evolution of the spirit. the power of the people is stronger than any weapon. a people’s r/evolution can’t be stopped. we need to be weapons of mass construction. weapons of mass love. it’s not enough just to change the system. we need to change ourselves. we have got to make this world user friendly. user friendly.
are you ready to sacrifice to end world hunger. to sacrifice to end colonialism. to end neo-colonialism. to end racism. to end sexism.
r/evolution means the end of exploitation. r/evolution means respecting people from other cultures. r/evolution is creative.
r/evolution means treating your mate as a friend and an equal. r/evolution is sexy.
r/evolution means respecting and learning from your children. r/evolution is beautiful.
r/evolution means protecting the people. the plants. the animals. the air. the water. r/evolution means saving this planet.
r/evolution is love.
”
”
Assata Shakur
“
I think I can communicate with kids because I don’t try to communicate with kids. Ninety percent of the children’s books patronize the child and say there’s a difference between you and me, so you listen to this story. I, for some reason or another, don’t do that. I treat the child as an equal.
”
”
Dr. Seuss
“
I Have a Dream... someday my son, Zyon and ALL individuals with disabilities will be seen as HUMAN beings.
I Have a Dream... someday the human & civil rights of individuals with disabilities are honored and they are treated as equals.
I Have a Dream... someday ALL parents who have children with disabilities see their child as a blessing and not a burden.
I Have a Dream... someday there will be more jobs and opportunities for individuals with disabilities.
I Have a Dream... someday there will be UNITY "within" the disabled community.
I HAVE A DREAM!!!
”
”
Yvonne Pierre (The Day My Soul Cried: A Memoir)
“
The man’s rights and the woman’s rights are the same size. They have the right to have their opinions and desires respected, to have a 50 percent say in decision making, to live free from verbal abuse and physical harm. Their children’s rights are somewhat smaller but substantial nonetheless; children can’t have an equal say in decisions because of their limited knowledge and experience, but they do have the right to live free from abuse and fear, to be treated with respect, and to have their voices heard on all issues that concern them.
”
”
Lundy Bancroft (Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men)
“
Children get dealt grossly unequal hands, but that is all the more reason to treat them equally in school, Chris thought. "I think the cruelest form of prejudice is... if I ever said, 'Clarence is poor, so I'll expect less of him than Alice.' Maybe he won't do what Alice does. But I want his best." She knew that precept wasn't as simple as it sounded. Treating children equally often means treating them very differently. But it also means bringing the same moral force to bear on all of them, saying, in effect, to Clarence that you matter as much as Alice and won't get away with not working, and to Alice that you won't be allowed to stay where you are either.
”
”
Tracy Kidder (Among Schoolchildren)
“
When women can decide whether and when to have children; when women can decide whether and when and whom to marry; when women have access to healthcare, do only our fair share of unpaid labor, get the education we want, make the financial decisions we need, are treated with respect at work, enjoy the same rights as men, and rise up with the help of other women and men who train us in leadership and sponsor us for high positions—then women flourish … and our families and communities flourish with us.
”
”
Melinda French Gates (The Moment of Lift: How Empowering Women Changes the World)
“
Having DID is, for many people, a very lonely thing. If this book reaches some people whose experiences resonate with mine and gives them a sense that they aren't alone, that there is hope, then I will have achieved one of my goals.
A sad fact is that people with DID spend an average of almost seven years in the mental health system before being properly diagnosed and receiving the specific help they need. During that repeatedly misdiagnosed and incorrectly treated, simply because clinicians fail to recognize the symptoms. If this book provides practicing and future clinicians certain insight into DID, then I will have accomplished another goal.
Clinicians, and all others whose lives are touched by DID, need to grasp the fundamentally illusive nature of memory, because memory, or the lack of it, is an integral component of this condition. Our minds are stock pots which are continuously fed ingredients from many cooks: parents, siblings, relatives, neighbors, teachers, schoolmates, strangers, acquaintances, radio, television, movies, and books. These are the fixings of learning and memory, which are stirred with a spoon that changes form over time as it is shaped by our experiences. In this incredibly amorphous neurological stew, it is impossible for all memories to be exact.
But even as we accept the complex of impressionistic nature of memory, it is equally essential to recognize that people who experience persistent and intrusive memories that disrupt their sense of well-being and ability to function, have some real basis distress, regardless of the degree of clarity or feasibility of their recollections.
We must understand that those who experience abuse as children, and particularly those who experience incest, almost invariably suffer from a profound sense of guilt and shame that is not meliorated merely by unearthing memories or focusing on the content of traumatic material. It is not enough to just remember. Nor is achieving a sense of wholeness and peace necessarily accomplished by either placing blame on others or by forgiving those we perceive as having wronged us. It is achieved through understanding, acceptance, and reinvention of the self.
”
”
Cameron West (First Person Plural: My Life as a Multiple)
“
When I consider the men (like my father) I have treated in psychotherapy, I recognize the challenge I face as a counselor. These men are in counseling due to an insistent wife, troubled child or their own addiction. They suffer a lack of connection with the people they say they love most. Chronically accused of being over controlling or emotionally absent, they feel at sea when their wives and children claim to be lonely in their presence. How can these people feel “un-loved” when (from his perspective) he has dedicated his life to their welfare?
Some of these men will express their lack of vitality and emotional engagement though endless service. They are hyperaware of the moods, needs and prefer-ences of loved ones, yet their self-neglect can be profound. This text examines how a lack of secure early attachment with caregivers can result in the tendency to self-abandon while managing connections with significant others. Their anxiety and distrust of the connection of others will manifest in anxious monitoring, over-giving, passive aggressive approaches to anger and chronic worry. For them, failure to anticipate and meet the needs of others equals abandonment.
”
”
Mary Crocker Cook (Codependency & Men)
“
The Christian up to his eyes in trouble can take comfort from the knowledge that in God’s kindly plan it all has a positive purpose, to further his sanctification. In this world, royal children have to undergo extra training and discipline which other children escape, in order to fit them for their high destiny. It is the same with the children of the King of kings. The clue to understanding all his dealings with them is to remember that throughout their lives he is training them for what awaits them, and chiseling them into the image of Christ. Sometimes the chiseling process is painful and the discipline irksome, but then the Scripture reminds us: “The Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son. Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons . . . No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it” (Heb 12:6-7,11). Only the person who has grasped this can make sense of Romans 8:28, “All things work together for good to them that love God” (KJV); equally, only he can maintain his assurance of sonship against satanic assault as things go wrong. But he who has mastered the truth of adoption both retains assurance and receives blessing in the day of trouble: this is one aspect of faith’s victory over the world. Meanwhile, however, the point stands that the Christian’s primary motive for holy living is not negative, the hope (vain!) that hereby he may avoid chastening, but positive, the impulse to show his love and gratitude to his adopting God by identifying himself with the Father’s will for him.
”
”
J.I. Packer (Knowing God)
“
These children, who are our equals, whom we ought to consider as our models, we treat them as though they were our subjects. They are allowed no will of their own. And have we, then, none ourselves? Whence comes our exclusive right? Is it because we are older and more experienced? Great God! from the height of thy heaven thou beholdest great children and little children, and no others; and thy Son has long since declared which afford thee greatest pleasure. But they believe in him, and hear him not,—that, too, is an old story; and they train their children after their own image, etc.
”
”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (The Sorrows of Young Werther)
“
What, I ask, has the fixed and solid nature of the earth to do with the right of appropriation?
(...)
But the creator of the land does not sell it: he gives it; and, in giving it, he is no respecter of persons. Why, then, are some of his children regarded as legitimate, while others are treated as bastards? If the equality of shares was an original right, why is the inequality of conditions a posthumous right?
”
”
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (What Is Property?)
“
I will be responsible for educating at least five students for three years. I will activate at least one water pond in my neighbourhood or nearest village. I will remove all enmity within my family and withdraw any court cases. I will plant five fruit bearing trees. I will not gamble and succumb to any addiction. I will treat male and female children in my family equally in education. I will lead from now onwards a righteous life free from corruption.
”
”
Acharya Mahapragya (The Family And The Nation)
“
If we can accept those who disagree with us, who are hurt and full of misunderstandings, we must treat them like Christ himself and love them as part of his body. No matter even how brethren can be used of the enemy even to sow discord, we must love such brethren for in the end we could be in a similar situation. No one is better we all need each other, God is not on the side of one of his children but loves all equally and desires to see all grow in him and become more like His Son Jesus.
”
”
Greg Gordon
“
Parental love is a matchless thing; if it weren't for that, most of us wouldn't have a pot to piss in, affectionately speaking. But even at its most irreplacable, it's still pretty cheap. Any ape loves their children; spiders lie still while theirs crawl around inside them, happy to let them eat their guts.
The only reason anybody unrelated is ever nice to anyone else, meanwhile, is as a sort of pre-emptive emotional strike - to prevent themselves from being treated as badly, potentially, as they might have treated other people. Which makes love only the lie two brains on spines tell each other, the lie that says: "You exist, because I love you. You exist, because you can see yourself in my eyes."
So we blunder from hope to hope, hollowed and searching. All of us equally incomplete.
And after all these years, still the sting comes, the liquid pressure in the chest and nose, the migraine-forerunner frown. Phantom pain. The ghost without the murder.
But what the fuck? That's all it is, ever. You want to be loved. You tell other people you love them, in order to trick them into loving you back. And after a while, it's true. You feel the pull, the ache.
”
”
Gemma Files (The Worm In Every Heart)
“
What are you so angry about?" my mother had asked me the last time I had gone home to visit.
Why aren't you more angry, I had wanted to ask her. But I couldn't talk to my mother that way. She understood that I did not want to live her life, to work as a waitress, until my toes curled in and my feet hurt all the time, to marry a man who would beat my children and treat me as if I had no right to object to object to anything he chose to do. She didn't want that life for me either. She wanted me happy and successful, to live unafraid among people who loved me, and to do things she had never been able to do and tell her all about them.
So I told her, about the shelter, the magazine, readings and discussion groups. I told her about trying to write stories, though I hesitated to send send her all that I wrote. And there were far too many times when I would sit down to write my mama and stare at the paper unable to puzzle out how to explain how urgent and unimportant it was to change how women's lives were shaped. Not only that we should be paid equal money for equally difficult work, but that we should genuinely begin to think about what word we might choose to undertake, how we might live our daily lives. Why should I have to marry at all? Or explain myself if I chose to love a woman? Why could I not spend my hours writing stories instead of raising children or keeping house or working some deadly boring job just to cover the rent of an apartments where I was not safe anyway.
”
”
Dorothy Allison (The Women's Room)
“
Those choices are not just for yourself. There will be the perplexing—and equally painful—task of having to explain to your children why they will not be treated as other Americans: that they will never be altogether accepted, that they will always be regarded warily, if not with suspicion or hostility.
”
”
Andrew Hacker (Two Nations: Black and White, Separate, Hostile, Unequal)
“
Do not show favouritism
Remember that it is very important to treat all parts with equal kindness; do not pick favourites. Every part is there for a purpose, and is an important part of the system. So, for instance, do not be afraid of hostile parts. It has been said that every persecutor is a misguided protector. Its protector job was important and necessary when it first developed, but it can be a handicap later in life when your needs are different. Most hostile insiders are using anger to protect vulnerable parts inside, usually younger children. If they seem dangerous, talk with them at first through another alter. But if you act scared, you will create a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Watch outfor good kid–bad kid dichotomies. You need to appreciate all your parts, just as they all need to accept one another.
”
”
Alison Miller (Becoming Yourself: Overcoming Mind Control and Ritual Abuse)
“
We have the ability to treat everyone equally under law; we have the ability to create governments to protect individual rights. But we don’t have the ability to guarantee that even two kids the same age living on the same street will start from the same point; two children growing up in the same family don’t even start from the same point. We certainly don’t have the ability to ensure that everyone ends at the same point.
”
”
Ben Shapiro (How to Destroy America in Three Easy Steps)
“
In some countries, the strictly Progressive man reveals himself to be just as much as if not more prejudiced than the typical Reactionary. There is at times a sort of arrogant condescension in one's gushing, bleeding-heartedness, in that, behind the mask of social activism, one is acting on behalf of one's perceived 'inferiors'. He may promote himself as the savior of the world; he may pat on the head all those he insidiously assumes to be the lesser, whether in status or class or ability, and treat them as helpless children: but the biggest danger of all is that by his own conscience he may feel for them, think for them, and thus, decide for them. It is with such, this artificial brand of empathy, and self-righteousness and narcissism, that we always naively yet so ignorantly pity 'the others', and ultimately, in our schemes to secure them, we merely hold them down.
”
”
Criss Jami (Healology)
“
What he wanted, Robin thought, was for Professor Lovell to admit what he'd done. That it was unnatural, this entire arrangement; that children were not stock to be experimented on, judged for their blood, spirited away from their homeland in service of Crown and country. That Robin was more than a talking dictionary, and that his motherland was more than a fat golden goose. But he knew these were acknowledgements that Professor Lovell would never make. The truth between them was not buried because it was painful, but because it was inconvenient, and because Professor Lovell simply refused to address it.
It was so obvious now that he was not, and could never be, a person in his father's eyes. No, personhood demanded the blood purity of the European man, the racial status that would make him Professor Lovell's equal. Little Dick and Philippa were persons. Robin Swift was an asset, and assets should be undyingly grateful that they were treated well at all.
”
”
R.F. Kuang (Babel)
“
from the broader picture, may very well have been invaluable: a dam that worked, a nursery where children fared well, a prison where the inmates were treated humanely. The campaign to eliminate illiteracy in the countryside was laudable, until it was given up. But when seen in the overall context of what happened to the country between 1949 and 1957, these isolated achievements did not amount to a broad trend towards equality, justice and freedom, the proclaimed values of the regime itself.
”
”
Frank Dikötter (The Tragedy of Liberation: A History of the Chinese Revolution 1945-1957 (Peoples Trilogy Book 2))
“
Young man,” he went on, raising his head again, “in your face I seem to read some trouble of mind. When you came in I read it, and that was why I addressed you at once. For in unfolding to you the story of my life, I do not wish to make myself a laughing-stock before these idle listeners, who indeed know all about it already, but I am looking for a man of feeling and education. Know then that my wife was educated in a high-class school for the daughters of noblemen, and on leaving, she danced the shawl dance before the governor and other personages for which she was presented with a gold medal and a certificate of merit. The medal … well, the medal of course was sold—long ago, hm … but the certificate of merit is in her trunk still and not long ago she showed it to our landlady. And although she is most continually on bad terms with the landlady, yet she wanted to tell some one or other of her past honours and of the happy days that are gone. I don’t condemn her for it. I don’t blame her, for the one thing left her is recollection of the past, and all the rest is dust and ashes. Yes, yes, she is a lady of spirit, proud and determined. She scrubs the floors herself and has nothing but black bread to eat, but won’t allow herself to be treated with disrespect. That’s why she would not overlook Mr. Lebeziatnikov’s rudeness to her, and so when he gave her a beating for it, she took to her bed more from the hurt to her feelings than from the blows. She was a widow when I married her, with three children, one smaller than the other. She married her first husband, an infantry officer, for love, and ran away with him from her father’s house. She was exceedingly fond of her husband; but he gave way to cards, got into trouble and with that he died. He used to beat her at the end: and although she paid him back, of which I have authentic documentary evidence, to this day she speaks of him with tears and she throws him up at me; and I am glad, I am glad that, though only in imagination, she should think of herself as having once been happy.… And she was left at his death with three children in a wild and remote district where I happened to be at the time; and she was left in such hopeless poverty that, although I have seen many ups and downs of all sorts, I don’t feel equal to describing it even. Her relations had all thrown her off. And she was proud, too, excessively proud.… And then, honoured sir, and then, I, being at the time a widower, with a daughter of fourteen left me by my first wife, offered her my hand, for I could not bear the sight of such suffering. You can judge the extremity of her calamities, that she, a woman of education and culture and distinguished family, should have consented to be my wife. But she did! Weeping and sobbing and wringing her hands, she married me! For she had nowhere to turn! Do you understand, sir, do you understand what it means when you have absolutely nowhere to turn? No, that you don’t understand yet…
”
”
Fyodor Dostoevsky (Crime and Punishment)
“
And here, the children who had learned that the experimenter was unreliable were more likely to eat the marshmallow before she came back, losing the opportunity to earn a second treat. Failing the marshmallow test—and being less successful in later life—may not be about lacking willpower. It could be a result of believing that adults are not dependable: that they can’t be trusted to keep their word, that they disappear for intervals of arbitrary length. Learning self-control is important, but it’s equally important to grow up in an environment where adults are consistently present and trustworthy.
”
”
Brian Christian (Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions)
“
We are not gods, and simply do not have the capacity to rectify imbalances of innate individual qualities. We have the ability to treat everyone equally under law; we have the ability to create governments to protect individual rights. But we don’t have the ability to guarantee that even two kids the same age living on the same street will start from the same point; two children growing up in the same family don’t even start from the same point. We certainly don’t have the ability to ensure that everyone ends at the same point. Setting up all Americans as either purveyors of a hierarchical and discriminatory system or as victims of that system, we disintegrate the ties that bind Americans together.
”
”
Ben Shapiro (How to Destroy America in Three Easy Steps)
“
International economic integration generally expands economic opportunities and is good for society. The great alternatives to economic integration failed. Attempts to seal countries off from the rest of the world economy in the 1930s were ultimately disastrous. Germany, Italy, and Japan closed their economies and also turned toward dictatorship, war, and conquest. The poor countries and former colonies that created closed economies in the 1930s and 1940s collapsed into economic stagnation, social unrest, crisis, and military dictatorships in the 1970s and 1980s. Few countries have achieved economic progress without access to the international economy.
But an insistence on globalization at all cost is equally misguided. During the golden age of global capitalism before 1914, governments committed themselves to international economic integration and little else. Supporters of free trade, the gold standard, and international finance wanted governments to limit themselves to safeguarding these policies and their properties. But these governments ignored the concerns of many harmed by globalization. As the working and middle classes grew, so did their demands for social reforms to improve the lot of the unemployed, the poor, children, and the elderly. The clash between classical orthodoxy and these new social movements turned into bitter, often violent, conflicts, especially once the Depression hit. Attempts to maintain global capitalism without addressing those ill treated by world markets drove societies toward polarization and conflict.
”
”
Jeffry A. Frieden (Global Capitalism: Its Fall and Rise in the Twentieth Century)
“
I got a servant, a nice clean German girl from the Volga. Her village had been devastated—no other word can convey my meaning—by the liquidation of the Kulaks. In the German Volga Republic the peasants, who had been settled there two hundred years before to set an example to the Russians, had been better farmers and so enjoyed a higher standard of life than most peasants in Russia. Consequently, the greater part of them were classified as Kulaks and liquidated.
***
The girls came to the towns to work as servants, and were highly prized, since they were more competent, cleaner, more honest and self-respecting than the Russian peasants. Curiously, they were the most purely Teutonic Germans I had ever seen, Germans like the pictures in Hans Andersen fairy tales, blue-eyed, with long golden plaits and lovely, fair skins. Being Protestants, and regarding the Russians around them as no better than barbarians, they had intermarried little and retained a racial purity which would no doubt have delighted Hitler.
***
My Hilda seemed a treasure. She could cook, she could read and write, she kept herself and the rooms clean and looked like a pink and flaxen doll. I could treat her as an equal without finding that this led to her stealing my clothes and doing no work.
The servant problem in Moscow for Jane and me lay in our inability to bully and curse and drive, which was the only treatment the Russian servant understood. It was quite natural that this should be so, since Soviet society, like Tsarist society but to a far higher degree, was based on force and cheating.
***
I was amazed at the outspoken way in which Hilda and Sophie (another German girl who worked for Jane) voiced their hatred and contempt of the Soviet Government. Sophie, one of thirteen children of a bedniak (poor peasant) would shake her fist and say:
“Kulaks! The Kulaks are up there in the Kremlin, not in the village.” Since the word “Kulak” originally signified an exploiter and usurer, her meaning was quite plain.
”
”
Freda Utley (Lost Illusion)
“
One way to try to answer the question “What makes us human?” is to ask “What makes us different from great apes?” or, to be more precise, from nonhuman apes, since, of course, humans are apes. As just about every human by now knows—and as the experiments with Dokana once again confirm—nonhuman apes are extremely clever. They’re capable of making inferences, of solving complex puzzles, and of understanding what other apes are (and are not) likely to know. When researchers from Leipzig performed a battery of tests on chimpanzees, orangutans, and two-and-a-half-year-old children, they found that the chimps, the orangutans, and the kids performed comparably on a wide range of tasks that involved understanding of the physical world. For example, if an experimenter placed a reward inside one of three cups, and then moved the cups around, the apes found the goody just as often as the kids—indeed, in the case of chimps, more often. The apes seemed to grasp quantity as well as the kids did—they consistently chose the dish containing more treats, even when the choice involved using what might loosely be called math—and also seemed to have just as good a grasp of causality. (The apes, for instance, understood that a cup that rattled when shaken was more likely to contain food than one that did not.) And they were equally skillful at manipulating simple tools. Where the kids routinely outscored the apes was in tasks that involved reading social cues. When the children were given a hint about where to find a reward—someone pointing to or looking at the right container—they took it. The apes either didn’t understand that they were being offered help or couldn’t follow the cue. Similarly, when the children were shown how to obtain a reward, by, say, ripping open a box, they had no trouble grasping the point and imitating the behavior. The apes, once again, were flummoxed. Admittedly, the kids had a big advantage in the social realm, since the experimenters belonged to their own species. But, in general, apes seem to lack the impulse toward collective problem-solving that’s so central to human society. “Chimps do a lot of incredibly smart things,” Michael Tomasello, who heads the institute’s department of developmental and comparative psychology, told me. “But the main difference we’ve seen is 'putting our heads together.' If you were at the zoo today, you would never have seen two chimps carry something heavy together. They don’t have this kind of collaborative project.
”
”
Elizabeth Kolbert (The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History)
“
Here is what I would like for you to know: In America, it is traditional to destroy the black body—it is heritage. Enslavement was not merely the antiseptic borrowing of labor—it is not so easy to get a human being to commit their body against its own elemental interest. And so enslavement must be casual wrath and random manglings, the gashing of heads and brains blown out over the river as the body seeks to escape. It must be rape so regular as to be industrial. There is no uplifting way to say this. I have no praise anthems, nor old Negro spirituals. The spirit and soul are the body and brain, which are destructible—that is precisely why they are so precious. And the soul did not escape. The spirit did not steal away on gospel wings. The soul was the body that fed the tobacco, and the spirit was the blood that watered the cotton, and these created the first fruits of the American garden. And the fruits were secured through the bashing of children with stovewood, through hot iron peeling skin away like husk from corn. It had to be blood. It had to be nails driven through tongue and ears pruned away. “Some disobedience,” wrote a Southern mistress. “Much idleness, sullenness, slovenliness…. Used the rod.” It had to be the thrashing of kitchen hands for the crime of churning butter at a leisurely clip. It had to be some woman “chear’d… with thirty lashes a Saturday last and as many more a Tuesday again.” It could only be the employment of carriage whips, tongs, iron pokers, handsaws, stones, paperweights, or whatever might be handy to break the black body, the black family, the black community, the black nation. The bodies were pulverized into stock and marked with insurance. And the bodies were an aspiration, lucrative as Indian land, a veranda, a beautiful wife, or a summer home in the mountains. For the men who needed to believe themselves white, the bodies were the key to a social club, and the right to break the bodies was the mark of civilization. “The two great divisions of society are not the rich and poor, but white and black,” said the great South Carolina senator John C. Calhoun. “And all the former, the poor as well as the rich, belong to the upper class, and are respected and treated as equals.” And there it is—the right to break the black body as the meaning of their sacred equality. And that right has always given them meaning, has always meant that there was someone down in the valley because a mountain is not a mountain if there is nothing below.*
”
”
Ta-Nehisi Coates (Between the World and Me (One World Essentials))
“
So down with religion and culture,” Abe asked. “Quite the opposite,” she answered. “People here are proud of where they come from, free to practice their religion, and open to share their cultures with one another. That is because they don’t have ignorant greedy men whispering in their ear that the reason they’re poor is because of ‘those people,’ or ‘remember 9/11.’ When you treat good people equally and give them the basic rights of a decent shelter, good food, clothing, and the safety of not having a suicide bomber or drone dead leveling their home or killing their loved ones. They have more time to learn and realize that the person sitting across from them who maybe a different skin color, or maybe worship the same God just a bit differently or call Him a different name is not that different. In the end, good people want the same thing all over the world for themselves and their children. Greedy people with power and a sense of entitlement are the ones that make this world a darker place. They use their influence to turn innocent people against one another by exploiting their weaknesses and misfortune in order to fuel their own agenda. Racism, corrupted use of religion, and fear are age-old business ploys men of power use to line their pockets.
”
”
Kipjo K. Ewers (EVO: UPRISING (The First, #2))
“
Crabtree's Parable of the Cards:
“We divide the deck into numbered and face cards, and so we divide the types of men. The numbered cards are the underlings, the parasites of the world. When you play a man who is a numbered card, he looks out only for himself with no consciousness that others are in the game with him. If you wish to be kind, you can say these men are the subordinates of the world, but they are parasites all the same. They attach themselves to someone greater, learning if they are young or inexperienced enough, leeching if they are strong or experienced enough to know better but would rather remain weak. They don’t contribute to the world. They only take from it, and if a man remains in this state, he is no better than a sheep. Numbered men are as disposable and interchangeable as the animals they mimic.
The face cards are men who have seen the way the world works, who know the only way to survive is to kill or be killed. These men are the cannibals. They drive and lead the parasites, bluffing them into traps and bleeding them when necessary for their own survival or for that of the parasites they have chosen to protect. Depending on what level of face card they are, they bleed them to serve those they owe allegiance to. This is the way of the world. You may find it harsh or overly simplified. But in the end you will find these are your choices. You may be a face card, or you may be a number. The power to choose is yours.
Aces are unique because they can be both a face card and a numbered card. But no matter what they are, they will always be the lowest of the low or the highest of the high—and because of this, they will always be alone. An ace does not evolve, but rather he constantly explores his dual nature. When he leads, he is acutely aware of his underlings, unable to use them with the casualness that his fellow face cards will do. When he is brought low, he is equally aware of the thin veil separating him from where he is supposed to be, and he can’t forget how he and his fellows in servitude should be treated. An ace is seldom at home unless he is with his own kind, and many fall into despair and find themselves wedged quite firmly in the low side of their nature. There are few aces in the world, and so most aces, no matter who they are with, feel alone. And that, my children, is the Parable of the Cards. Take it to heart, because the secret to life lies within it.
”
”
Heidi Cullinan (Double Blind (Special Delivery, #2))
“
For the first time, she realized that Zachary Bronson was becoming more real, more influential to her daughter than George ever would. Bronson had played hunt-the-slipper and hide-and-seek with Rose, and had sampled the jam that she “helped” the cook make one rainy afternoon, and built her a house of playing cards as they sat on the floor in front of the fire. Things her father would never be able to do with her. Bronson never ignored Rose or dismissed her questions as silly. In fact, he treated her as if she were equally valuable, if not more so, as any other member of the household. Most adults regarded children as merely half-formed people, undeserving of rights or privileges until they came of age. But Bronson was clearly fond of the child, and Rose was in turn becoming fond of him.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Where Dreams Begin)
“
According to the prevailing double standard, the young man who was equally responsible for the pregnancy was not condemned for his actions. It was her fault, not their fault, that she got pregnant. This was in that period of time when there wasn’t much worse that a girl could do. They almost treated you like you had committed murder or something. —
”
”
Ann Fessler (The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade)
“
One of the greatest obstacles for blind children, not just in Tibet but everywhere in the world, is that they are seldom treated equally with sighted children, that they are perceived as being helpless, as somehow special and different. "In families and the community beyond, very little is expected of the blind child. This reinforces in them the feeling that they are useless and incapable. Special isn't good either way.
”
”
Rosemary Mahoney
“
Sulloway (1996, 2011) proposed that the adaptive problems imposed by parents on children will create different “niches” for children, depending on their birth order. Specifically, because parents often favor the oldest child, the firstborn tends to be relatively more conservative and more likely to support the status quo. Second-borns, however, have little to gain by supporting the existing structure and everything to gain by rebelling against it. Later-borns, especially middle-borns, according to Sulloway, develop a more rebellious personality because they have the least to gain by maintaining the existing order; studies of birth order and personality confirm this prediction (Healey & Ellis, 2007). The youngest, on the other hand, might receive more parental investment than middle children, as parents often let out all the stops to invest in their final direct reproductive vehicle. Salmon and Daly (1998) find support for these predictions. They discovered that middle-borns differ from first- and last-borns in scoring lower on measures of family solidarity and identity. Middle-borns, for example, are less likely to name a genetic relative as the person to whom they feel closest. They are also less likely to assume the role of family genealogist. Middle-borns, compared to firstborns and last-borns, are less positive in attitudes toward their families and less likely to help a family member who needs help (Salmon, 2003). These and other results (Salmon, 1999) lend some support to Sulloway’s theory that birth order affects the niches a person selects. Firstborns are more likely to feel solidarity with parents and perceive them as dependable, whereas middle-borns appear more likely to invest in bonds outside of the family. Interestingly, middle-born children might receive less total investment from parents even if parents treat all their children equally (Hertwig, Davis, & Sulloway, 2002). This result occurs because firstborns receive all of their parents’ investments early in life before other children are born and last-borns receive all of their parents’ investments after all other children leave the house. Middle-borns, in contrast, must share their parents’ investments, because there is rarely a time when other siblings are not around. Even when parents strive to invest equally in their children, middle-borns end up on the short end of the stick—perhaps accounting for why middle-borns are less identified with their families (Hertwig et al., 2002).
”
”
David M. Buss (Evolutionary Psychology: The New Science of the Mind)
“
Instead, the default approach may be to minimize the situation by taking the color-blind position that “all children should be treated equally” in an attempt to make the problem go away. With this, people feel all bases are covered. After all, teaching children citizenship and values of respect and being good people should be enough for a family or classroom. But is this really so? Does this truly prepare children for instances of sudden self-awareness that they are different? Or for instances of intentional or unintentional othering by the child’s friend who notices that their facial or other physical features don’t match others around them? The absence of dialogue may cause
”
”
Farzana Nayani (Raising Multiracial Children: Tools for Nurturing Identity in a Racialized World)
“
Children, look at the flowers at your feet; do not trample upon them. Look at the love in your midst and do not repudiate it. KRISHNA. There is a higher reason which transcends all human minds. It is far and near. It permeates all the worlds and at the same time is infinitely higher than they. A man who sees that all things are contained in the higher spirit cannot treat any being with contempt. For him to whom all spiritual beings are equal to the highest there can be no room for deception or grief. Those who are ignorant and are devoted to the religious rites only, are in a deep gloom, but those who are given up to fruitless meditations are in a still greater darkness.
”
”
Leo Tolstoy (A Letter to a Hindu)
“
To me everyone is equal, until they feel the urge to offer advise based on some stroneage tradition. That moment, I stop considering them as equal humans, and start treating them as adolescent children. Whenever you feel the audacity to advise a reformer, ask yourself this - what exactly have you done for the society that makes you qualified to judge a reformer? I sacrificed my youth for the world. What have you done? I put off starting a family for the world. What have you done? I obliterated my national and cultural identity for the world. What have you done? Till you've abolished the last trace of active bigotry, intolerance and fanatical fantasies from your mind, don't you dare touch my work. Everybody can quote Naskar, not everybody can accompany Naskar.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets)
“
She thought of the story of Ruth in the Bible: “Whither thou goest, I will go.” Their sons would be taught to treat women as equals, and their daughters would grow up independent and strong-willed. Perhaps they would eventually settle in a town house in Berlin, so that their children could go to good German schools. At
”
”
Ken Follett (Fall of Giants (The Century Trilogy #1))
“
What would happen if we began treating children as equals on our mutual quests to follow Jesus?
”
”
David M. Csinos (Children's Ministry in the Way of Jesus)
“
You could say that they had already gotten their share of the copper mining fortune of W.A. Clark. The millions had been divided equally among his five surviving children: Huguette and her four half-siblings from his first marriage. Each of W.A.'s five children who lived to adulthood had received one-fifth of his estate after his death in 1925 equal shares for May, Katherine, Charlie, Will, and Huguette. Huguette got her allowance for a couple of years, and eventually got something extra, inheriting Bellosguardo and the jewels and cash that her mother received from her prenup. But W.A.'s plan, it seemed, was to treat each of his children equally.
”
”
Bill Dedman (Empty Mansions: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark and the Spending of a Great American Fortune)
“
You will be outraged by this who's going to protect the kids involved when battered women can't even tell their truth your attorney will tell you listen, you don't understand something, the court doesn't protect children the court doesn't care about children the law treats children like property of their parents so when you divorce, you're basically dividing them up. And why would they give equal parts to a woman who lets herself get beat up. This will piss you off even more you will rise out of your chair how am I letting myself get beat up I LEFT and why is that my bad and not his and what about children's rights!? He will turn to you coldly you think children have rights? Children don't have rights. You have rights. Your ex has rights. Your children are your joint property. They don't have rights. Even with the outrage and the disbelief and the rush of dizziness you'll feel over this news, you will still not know to utter the words systemic evil.
”
”
H.G. Beverly (The Other Side of Charm: Your Memoir)
“
Gareth strode straight up to Lucien, seized his shoulder and spun him roughly around on his heel. The pistol went flying from the dummy's wooden hand. "I beg your pardon," Lucien said, raising his brows at Gareth's open display of hostility. "Where is she?" The duke turned back to his target and calmly reloaded his pistol. "Probably halfway to Newbury by now, I should think," he said, mildly. "Do go away, dear boy. This is no sport for children like yourself, and I wouldn't want you to get hurt." The condescending remark cut deep. Gareth marched around to face his brother. They were of equal height, equal build, and almost of equal weight, and his blue eyes blazed into Lucien's black ones as he seized the duke's perfect white cravat and yanked him close. Lucien's eyes went cold, and he reached up and caught Gareth's wrist in an iron grip of his own. All civility vanished. "Don't push me," the duke warned, menacingly. "I've had all I can take of your childish pranks and degenerate friends." "You dare call me a child?" "Yes, and I will continue to do so as long as you continue to act like one. You are lazy, feckless, dissolute, useless. You are an embarrassment to this family — especially to me. When you grow up and learn the meaning of responsibility, Gareth, perhaps I shall treat you with the respect I did your brother." "How dare you talk to me of responsibility when you banish an innocent young woman to fend for herself, and she with a six-month-old baby who happens to be your niece! You're a cold-hearted, callous, unfeeling bastard!" The duke pushed him away, lifting his chin as he repaired the damage to his cravat. "She was handsomely paid. She has more than enough money to get back to those godforsaken colonies from which she came, more than enough to see herself and her bastard babe in comfort for the rest of her life. She is no concern of yours." Bastard babe. Gareth pulled back and sent his fist crashing into Lucien's jaw with a force that nearly took his brother's head off. The duke staggered backward, his hand going to his bloodied mouth, but he did not fall. Lucien never fell. And in that moment Gareth had never hated him more. "I'm going to find her," Gareth vowed, as Lucien, coldly watching him, took out a handkerchief and dabbed at his mouth. "And when I do, I'm going to marry her, take care of her and that baby as Charles should have done — as it's our duty to do. Then I dare you to call me a child and her little baby a bastard!" He spun on his heel and marched back across the lawn. "Gareth!" He kept walking. "Gareth!" He swung up on Crusader and thundered away. ~~~~
”
”
Danelle Harmon (The Wild One (The de Montforte Brothers, #1))
“
For the question of abortion, perhaps the most significant passage of all is found in the specific laws God gave Moses for the people of Israel during the time of the Mosaic covenant. One particular law spoke of the penalties to be imposed in case the life or health of a pregnant woman or her preborn child was endangered or harmed: When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman, so that her children come out, but there is no harm, the one who hit her shall surely be fined, as the woman’s husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine. But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe (Exod. 21:22–25).1 This law concerns a situation when men are fighting and one of them accidentally hits a pregnant woman. Neither one of them intended to do this, but as they fought they were not careful enough to avoid hitting her. If that happens, there are two possibilities: 1. If this causes a premature birth but there is no harm to the pregnant woman or her preborn child, there is still a penalty: “The one who hit her shall surely be fined” (v. 22). The penalty was for carelessly endangering the life or health of the pregnant woman and her child. We have similar laws in modern society, such as when a person is fined for drunken driving, even though he has hit no one with his car. He recklessly endangered human life and health, and he deserved a fine or other penalty. 2. But “if there is harm” to either the pregnant woman or her child, then the penalties are quite severe: “Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth …” (vv. 23–24). This means that both the mother and the preborn child are given equal legal protection. The penalty for harming the preborn child is just as great as for harming the mother. Both are treated as persons, and both deserve the full protection of the law.2
”
”
Wayne Grudem (Politics - According to the Bible: A Comprehensive Resource for Understanding Modern Political Issues in Light of Scripture)
“
This law is even more significant when we put it in the context of other laws in the Mosaic covenant. In other cases in the Mosaic law where someone accidentally caused the death of another person, there was no requirement to give “life for life,” no capital punishment. Rather, the person who accidentally caused someone else’s death was required to flee to one of the “cities of refuge” until the death of the high priest (see Num. 35:9–15, 22–29). This was a kind of “house arrest,” although the person had to stay within a city rather than within a house for a limited period of time. It was a far lesser punishment than “life for life.” This means that God established for Israel a law code that placed a higher value on protecting the life of a pregnant woman and her preborn child than the life of anyone else in Israelite society. Far from treating the death of a preborn child as less significant than the death of others in society, this law treats the death of a preborn child or its mother as more significant and worthy of more severe punishment. And the law does not place any restriction on the number of months the woman was pregnant. Presumably it would apply from a very early stage in pregnancy, whenever it could be known that a miscarriage had occurred and her child or children had died as a result. Moreover, this law applies to a case of accidental killing of a preborn child. But if accidental killing of a preborn child is so serious in God’s eyes, then surely intentional killing of a preborn child must be an even worse crime. The conclusion from all of these verses is that the Bible teaches that we should think of the preborn child as a person from the moment of conception, and we should give to the preborn child legal protection at least equal to that of others in the society. Additional note: It is likely that many people reading this evidence from the Bible, perhaps for the first time, will already have had an abortion. Others reading this will have encouraged someone else to have an abortion. I cannot minimize or deny the moral wrong involved in this action, but I can point to the repeated offer of the Bible that God will give forgiveness of sins to those who repent of their sin and trust in Jesus Christ for forgiveness: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). Although such sin, like all other sin, deserves God’s wrath, Jesus Christ took that wrath on himself as a substitute for all who would believe in him: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed” (1 Peter 2:24). b. Scientific
”
”
Wayne Grudem (Politics - According to the Bible: A Comprehensive Resource for Understanding Modern Political Issues in Light of Scripture)
“
This law is even more significant when we put it in the context of other laws in the Mosaic covenant. In other cases in the Mosaic law where someone accidentally caused the death of another person, there was no requirement to give “life for life,” no capital punishment. Rather, the person who accidentally caused someone else’s death was required to flee to one of the “cities of refuge” until the death of the high priest (see Num. 35:9–15, 22–29). This was a kind of “house arrest,” although the person had to stay within a city rather than within a house for a limited period of time. It was a far lesser punishment than “life for life.” This means that God established for Israel a law code that placed a higher value on protecting the life of a pregnant woman and her preborn child than the life of anyone else in Israelite society. Far from treating the death of a preborn child as less significant than the death of others in society, this law treats the death of a preborn child or its mother as more significant and worthy of more severe punishment. And the law does not place any restriction on the number of months the woman was pregnant. Presumably it would apply from a very early stage in pregnancy, whenever it could be known that a miscarriage had occurred and her child or children had died as a result. Moreover, this law applies to a case of accidental killing of a preborn child. But if accidental killing of a preborn child is so serious in God’s eyes, then surely intentional killing of a preborn child must be an even worse crime. The conclusion from all of these verses is that the Bible teaches that we should think of the preborn child as a person from the moment of conception, and we should give to the preborn child legal protection at least equal to that of others in the society. Additional note: It is likely that many people reading this evidence from the Bible, perhaps for the first time, will already have had an abortion. Others reading this will have encouraged someone else to have an abortion. I cannot minimize or deny the moral wrong involved in this action, but I can point to the repeated offer of the Bible that God will give forgiveness of sins to those who repent of their sin and trust in Jesus Christ for forgiveness: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). Although such sin, like all other sin, deserves God’s wrath, Jesus Christ took that wrath on himself as a substitute for all who would believe in him: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed” (1 Peter 2:24).
”
”
Wayne Grudem (Politics - According to the Bible: A Comprehensive Resource for Understanding Modern Political Issues in Light of Scripture)
“
Everyone was equal there. Men, women, children, and people you couldn’t say what they were. All the various skin tones, and wherever you came from before, it didn’t matter. In this new place you made it all new, and people were just people, meant to be equal, and to treat each other respectfully at all times. It
”
”
Kim Stanley Robinson (New York 2140)
“
When I was a girl I assumed I was the equal to any boy and that I would be treated the same as an adult. For the most part that was the case—until I had children, at which point I discovered that there is always a choice to be made, always a compromise, and that in most cases that belongs to the woman.
”
”
Jojo Moyes (Still Me (Me Before You #3))
“
here are some things that help build trust and pave the way for effective and intimate communication between spouses: Consistently saying and doing the right things Keeping promises Being faithful and sexually pure Taking responsibility for your behavior and not transferring blame Being sensitive to your spouse and meeting their needs Validating your spouse’s feelings even when you don’t understand or agree Treating your spouse as an equal and valuing their input Protecting your spouse from children, in-laws, or others who are saying or doing things that are negative or harmful Being truthful in a loving manner Keeping confidences and not divulging private matters to others Saying you are sorry and asking for forgiveness Being forgiving and gracious Being positive and faith-filled
”
”
Jimmy Evans (The Four Laws of Love: Guaranteed Success for Every Married Couple)
“
We can’t choose the colour of our skin. We can’t choose the family we are born into. We can’t choose to be tall or short, right or left-handed, just as how we can’t choose to be born male or female, gay or straight. But I believe there are many things in life that we can choose. We can choose to embrace and treat our fellow human beings, including our LGBTQ brothers and sisters, equally, and with kindness, dignity and respect. We can choose to raise our children to be secure and confident in who they are and to teach all our young ones to be compassionate and accepting of those who are different from them. We can choose to be big-hearted and open-minded as a society, one where all Singaporeans—no matter our race, language, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity—can feel included and feel a part of this place we call home.
”
”
Janice Koh
“
In these days (600s), European women were treated as perpetual children.
”
”
Pénélope Bagieu
“
I'm mother to a 20-year-old and I think that the best warning I can give other mothers out there, is to stop expecting and encouraging your child /children to have, or to find, partners that fill-in the missing links for you; that finish your job as a mother for you. It's lazy and selfish. I don't expect my son to ever be with someone who mothers him, treats him like an infant, coddles him, or tries to draw him closer to God. I do not expect my son to find a partner who does my jobs for me. My jobs are mine. My son ought to find a real partner, an equal, an exciting companion to spend his days with. Not a pseudo-mom or an auntie. Please stop expecting that for your children; it's narcissistic and it robs them of a well-lived experience of life.
”
”
C. JoyBell C.
“
Focus on treating disparity, not faith. Focus on instilling equality, not atheism.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Earthquakin' Egalitarian: I Die Everyday So Your Children Can Live)
“
I think everyone— blacks, whites, and all races should treat each other with respect, love, and live in a peaceful world. However, it’s as if our country is in a drought and nobody wants to fetch the water. Therefore, with all of the selfishness in America, people's beliefs will be passed down to their children and the cycle of racism and hate will continue.
”
”
Charlena E. Jackson (Why Are You Obsessed with My Race?)
“
In the 1960s, helping professionals began actively promoting a child-rearing philosophy which holds that parent and child are equals-not in theory, mind you, but in fact. According to psychologist Thomas Gordon, one of the chief architects of the democratic family movement and author of Parent Effectiveness Training (1970), or P.E. T, one of the all-time best-sellers in the parenting field, parents should treat children as they would treat adult friends.
”
”
John Rosemond (To Spank Or Not To Spank (John Rosemond Book 5))
“
The more one-sided a society's observance of strict moral principles such as orderliness, cleanliness, and hostility toward instinctual drives, and the more deep-seated its fear of the other side of human nature vitality, spontaneity, sensuality, critical judgment, and inner independence the more strenuous will be its efforts to isolate this hidden territory, to surround it with silence or institutionalize it. Prostitution, the pornography trade, and the almost obligatory obscenity typical of traditionally all-male groups such as the military are part of the legalized, even requisite reverse side of this cleanliness and order. Splitting of the human being into two parts, one that is good, meek, conforming, and obedient and the other that is the diametrical opposite is perhaps as old as the human race, and one could simply say that it is part of "human nature." Yet it has been my experience that when people have had the opportunity to seek and live out their true self in analysis, this split disappears of itself. They perceive both sides, the conforming as well as the so-called obscene, as two extremes of the false self, which they now no longer need. (...) This case and similar ones make me wonder if it will not one day be possible to let children grow up in such a way that they can later have more respect for all sides of their nature and not be forced to suppress the forbidden sides to the point where they must be lived out in violent and obscene ways. Obscenity and cruelty are not a true liberation from compulsive behavior but are its by-products. Free sexuality is never obscene, nor does violence ever result if a person is able to deal openly with his or her aggressive impulses, to acknowledge feelings such as anger and rage as responses to real frustration, hurt, and humiliation. How can it have come about that the split I have just described is attributed to human nature as a matter of course even though there is evidence that it can be overcome without any great effort of will and without legislating morality? The only explanation I can find is that these two sides are perpetuated in the way children are raised and treated at a very early age, and the accompanying split between them is therefore regarded as "human nature." The "good" false self is the result of what is called socialization, of adapting to society's norms, consciously and intentionally passed on by the parents; the "bad", equally false self is rooted in the child's earliest observations of parental behavior, visible only to the child's devoted, unsuspecting eyes and stored up in his or her unconscious, this behavior is what comes to be regarded, generation after generation, as "human nature".
”
”
Alice Miller
“
It shouldn't even be up for discussion, in a perfect world. The rights of women should be sacrosanct. If men bore children, there would be no need for law; the right would simply exist. As a woman, I take great exception to my rights being used as a political platform by greedy and dishonest politicians to gather voters to their side. It reinforces the fact that women--in general--are viewed as lesser beings in our society.
That being said, I appreciate your thoughts on this subject, Tom. As men go, you're exceptional. I hate what most people view as feminism these days. It's become ugly and combative, and the movement has lost its focus. It's become a man vs. woman "blame game", and it has to stop before we can evolve further. To me, feminism is simply equal rights--HUMAN rights. I will always thank a guy for those lovely gestures like holding my door and helping me with my coat. I'm old-fashioned that way. However, I realize that if I want to be respected, I have to give a man something to respect. I treat him and his feelings with equal care. A lot of my "new feminist" friends hate me because I actually THINK that it's okay to be pretty, to shave my legs and under my arms, to have long hair and to smile...and I choose to keep my bra, not burn it.
Like Bukowski said, "I have little time for things for things that have no soul." That sums up our government, our politicians and their shameless manipulation of my rights as a woman. I saw my Grandmother and my Mom destroyed by the way that it was back in the good old days. I'll always be grateful for the strong and quiet femininity that they've passed on to me, and for the passionate blood in my veins manifested as a child born in the era of revolution.
”
”
Lioness DeWinter
“
When children who are internalizers have self-involved or emotionally unengaging parents, they do think that being helpful and neglecting their own needs will win their parent’s love. However, being counted on does not equal being loved and the emptiness of this strategy becomes obvious. Despite that, these children still believe that to make a connection, they need to put other people’s needs before theirs and treat others as more important. They believe that by being the giver in a relationship, they can sustain it but they do not know that conditional behavior cannot get unconditional love.
”
”
Theresa J. Covert (Emotionally Immature Parents: Overcoming Childhood Emotional Neglect due to Absent and Self involved Parents)
“
relations.50 The idea of collective child-rearing was not unique to kibbutzim. It has been periodically attempted as a desired social disruption since antiquity. Plato believed that raising children communally would result in children treating all men as their fathers and thus more respectfully.51 Communist societies have also been associated with collective child-rearing; the family is seen as a threat to state ideology because it fosters a sense of belonging to a family unit, and totalitarian ideology requires that family allegiance be subordinated to allegiance to the party or state. Liberal political theory has also struggled with the issue of the family being an obstacle to an egalitarian society (for example, because child care and family life generally impose greater constraints on women).52 But attempts to fundamentally restructure or minimize the bond between parent and child have very rarely, if ever, endured.53 While mild forms of collective child-rearing are found in cultures all around the world (and in some other mammalian species, as we will see in chapter 7), they typically involve forms of alloparental care, whereby relatives share child-care duties. Dormitory sleeping arrangements for infants (of the kind initially attempted by the kibbutzim) are extremely rare. A 1971 survey of 183 societies around the world found that none maintained such a system.54 As in many utopian communities, the organization of child-rearing was motivated largely by adult imperatives. If men and women were to be treated truly equally, collective parenting might be seen as an obvious structural necessity, regardless of its implications for individual children and their development. Historian Steven Mintz noted in Huck’s Raft, his sweeping work on American childhood, that almost every innovation in child welfare in the United States, including orphanages and subsidized child care, has been driven primarily by adult concerns. Of secondary importance were philosophical and pragmatic convictions about what was best for children.55 As radical as communes may be in some key respects, they generally play by adult rules in regard to children, whose needs and concerns have never been, as far as I can tell, the primary motivation for any utopian community (even though some of them had amazing schools and treated children kindly). Setting up utopias seems to be like sex in at least one way: it is oriented to adult satisfaction.
”
”
Nicholas A. Christakis (Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society)
“
Among us the poor white laborer is respected as an equal. His family is treated with kindness, consideration and respect. He does not belong to the menial class. The negro is in no sense of the term his equal. He feels and knows this. He belongs to the only true aristocracy, the race of white men. He blacks no masters boots, and bows the knee to no one save God alone. He receives higher wages for his labor, than does the laborer of any other portion of the world, and he raises up his children, with the knowledge, that they belong to no inferior cast; but that the highest members of the society in which he lives, will, if their conduct is good, respect and treat them as equals.
”
”
Ta-Nehisi Coates (We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy)
“
I had a conversation with my grandmother months before she passed away. She was ninety-four years old, a five-foot-tall pistol of a woman, and the wife of a well-respected Texas judge. Somewhat unusual for her generation, she was a woman determined to have a college degree. She was smart, opinionated, and stubborn as hell. Her second child was born severely crippled at a time when handicapped people were harshly discriminated against and families were taught to be ashamed. However, my grandmother would not back down. She fought for the rights of handicapped children, fought to change legislation to provide them equal rights, and fought to change how handicapped people (especially her son) were viewed and treated. My grandmother achieved social change, and is responsible for securing the Austin State School, a place where mentally disabled persons could live on their own with dignity. But she did not do this for the prestigious accolades or lifetime achievement awards. She did it because she believed that all people should be treated with respect. She did it because she believed that her voice mattered and that real change was possible.
”
”
Alexis Jones (I Am That Girl: How to Speak Your Truth, Discover Your Purpose, and #bethatgirl)